


Let Not My Love Be Called Idolatry

by lostlenore



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Bodyguard, M/M, Modern Royalty
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-08
Updated: 2015-05-08
Packaged: 2018-03-25 08:21:37
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,565
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3803431
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lostlenore/pseuds/lostlenore
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Liam would make a terrible princess.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Let Not My Love Be Called Idolatry

**Author's Note:**

> AHAHAHA [NO???](http://40.media.tumblr.com/11ede18cdf2708d40d4826283949ba15/tumblr_nfo5y1WMsy1u1l4uso1_1280.jpg)
> 
> Was going to post this under a pseud, but its not like I have a developed sense of shame anyways. Shout-out to Amy who responded to my SOS with 'how can I make this worse?' like a true bro. Title is Shakespeare.

 If someone had told Liam at sixteen, bullied and brow-beaten in his shithole of a public secondary school, that this would be his future, Liam would have laughed in their face.

It's a struggle not to laugh even now, at the way the high, wide windows throw streaks of heavy afternoon sunlight across the ballroom floor, gilding the two figures in the centre in a warm gold. Six years working here, and the building remains every bit the fairytale castle Liam thought it was when he first arrived.

Ridiculous.

Like a fever dream he once had, Liam thinks.  The spindly black folding chair he's sitting on right now might as well be a mirage. He's definitely not holding a stereo for the Queen of all Bradford and watching her try, and fail, to correct Zayn's slouch into proper waltzing posture.  That would be absolutely absurd.  

He pinches himself.

The Queen is still there, wincing her way across the formal ballroom as Zayn steps on her toes every time he moves, blushing and stammering apologies. He's a properly hopeless dancer, Liam thinks, humming along to Blue Danube. The Queen is making a valiant effort to keep him on the beat, but even Liam can tell Zayn's footwork is an unmitigated disaster from where he's tucked against the wall, clutching the ancient boom box the 90's puked out into the storage room. 

Zayn is an equally improbable, impossibly wonderful addition to the entire absurd fantasy of living and working in Bradford's imperial palace. Liam sighs. Just looking at him Zayn could be any manic uni student plucked from campus with his exaggerated slouch and plain collared shirt a size too big, all long hair and a whiff of cigarette smoke. And yet when he stands just so, shoulders straight like a soldier with a crown of sunlight, Zayn looks every inch the prince he's meant to be, and so far removed from the boy that Liam woke up to in his bed that Liam wants to beat his head against the floor. Fever dream or not, Liam always finishes what he starts, and the sum and total of the thing is that he loves Zayn more than he properly should. And Liam would make a terrible princess. 

Over the Queen's shoulder Zayn catches Liam's eye and mouths something that looks a lot like _save me_ , before he's whisked around and around again. Liam bites down on a smile. Had the upcoming charity dinner been any other dinner, Zayn probably could have skivved off. He's certainly done it before, dragging Liam away with him to explore the gardens and libraries and coat closets of Bradford's rich and famous. Honestly, Liam's surprised he's gotten away with it as long as he has. You'd think a prince would know how to waltz by the time he turned 23, but Zayn lives to subvert expectations.

He clucks his tongue just as the Queen makes a sharp, pained noise and drops Zayn's hands.

" _Sorry!_ Sorry mum, I didn't mean to-" Zayn's entire face is flushed. He looks well and truly embarrassed. 

"Oh hush, I know you didn't. Liam!"

Liam starts, and hurriedly switches off the sound.

"Your Majesty," Liam straightens up and brushes off his slacks so he can school his face into something impassive. She's caught him doing much more embarrassing things on the palace grounds than daydreaming about her son, but he rather not give her the extra ammunition. 

"Liam, love, come fill in for me for awhile. My toes need a break and lord knows Zayn will at least feel a little guilty about stepping all over you." 

"Of course," Liam says, and tries to discreetly wipe his suddenly sweating palms on his suit jacket. He feels a little ill as he crosses to where Zayn is standing alone in the middle of the ballroom, nervously chewing his lip. 

"Alright, once more with feeling!" The queen calls out. She looks very satisfied to have stolen Liam's chair and is rubbing at the arches of her feet, expensive Parisian heels discarded on the floor. "Zayn, I know Liam's a bit taller but I want you to try leading this time." 

Zayn gulps, but nods. 

'Hands in position now! Liam, your first step is going to be backwards, with your right foot please." 

"Yes ma'am." 

Liam takes Zayn's hand in his, marveling, not for the first time, at how it fairly disappears in his own. Zayn's hand comes to rest wide and possessive across his shoulder, and it brings them approximately flush together. 

"Hi," Liam says shyly. There's nowhere to look but straight at Zayn's excruciatingly beautiful face. 

Zayn barks a surprised laugh and leans forward that extra centimeter more, to rest his forehead against Liam's.

"Hi," he whispers. "Can you believe this? She's gone completely mad."

"You were always going to have to learn sooner or later," Liam chides. "Can't hide away with me in a broom closet forever, it's sort of frowned upon. Especially at the commencement of your own charity."

Zayn gives him an absolutely incendiary look through his lashes. "I could be persuasive," he says, voice pitched low, and Liam has to fight the shiver that voice sends down his spine. Distantly, he registers the Queen has turned the music back on. Something grandly orchestral and romantic. She's (helpfully) counting out the beats, strings of _one-two-three_ , _one-two-three'_ s for them to match, if they could stop stumbling and laughing and knocking into each other.

The music swells around them just as Zayn finally finds his footing and they're off, spinning madly across the hall on a rising tide of violins. 

Liam's body feels two steps ahead of his brain. It's an effort to switch off, relax, and let Zayn guide them through the melody, when he's usually the one sheltering Zayn from overzealous crowds, or tugging him through another airport with shitty available cover. The reversal takes some getting used to. Liam's the taller one between them, but not by much. Certainly the broader of the two though, the hand he's resting on the ball of Zayn's shoulder covers it entirely, if he stretches his fingers out wide.

He glances down at Zayn, whose eyes are fever bright, with matching twin spots of color high on his cheeks. Liam wants to kiss him so badly in that moment it's like a blow to the chest.

The Queen clears her throat, the sound echoing in the newfound silence. Liam had forgotten she was even there. 

And _oh_.  

The music stopped.

Liam skids to a halt, Zayn knocking into him and grabbing hold of Liam's shirt to keep from toppling over. He rights himself, but doesn't remove the hand curled tight at the small of Liam's back. 

"Practice makes perfect boys," she points one neatly manicured finger at Zayn, "you have until the end of the week. Do your best." 

"Yes Your Highness," Liam croaks out, while beside him Zayn murmurs his assent. 

She pins them with one last look before sweeping out of the room in a click of heels. 

Zayn lets the doors fall shut behind her before he buries his face in Liam's shoulder and breaks down in a fit of nervous giggles. 

"Well, that could have gone worse I suppose," Liam says, trying for optimistic. He plucks at Zayn's twisted collar and frowns, smoothing it so it lies flat against the nape of his neck. The overlarge shirt is suddenly embarrassingly familiar. 

"Stealing from your subjects again Malik? Bad habits, the press will have a scandal with it." 

"You love it, don't lie to your prince," he grins up at Liam, cheeky, and stands on tiptoe to press a quick kiss to the tip of Liam's nose. 

"If we don't leave we're going to get interrupted by one of your sisters again," Liam points out fairly. 

Zayn huffs, but threads their fingers together. "Fine. Your room then?"

"You have lecture in half an hour--" Liam sounds unconvincing, even to himself. 

"It's a broadcast lecture. I can be quick." 

"If only you were this motivated to learn the waltz," Liam mutters, and lets Zayn drag him, beaming, off to the staff residence.  

***

The afternoon slips away almost unnoticeably from where they’re curled around each other on Liam’s bed, the last of the fast-fading twilight lending the room its drowsy warmth. Zayn has his laptop perched across his knees, one earbud generously looped between them so Liam can listen to some professor at Harvard gush about 19th century French Modernism in her flat American drawl.

He’s struggling to stay awake; not even because he’s on shift, but because Zayn is paying such rapt attention to the screen, a sleepy smile on his face as the professor rambles on and on unbearably. Liam was never particularly good at school; his grades were middling and he spent most of his time praying for graduation to come as swiftly and painlessly as possible. He’s never _loved_ school like Zayn does. Zayn gets so excited when he talks about his art history courses that he forgets what he’s supposed to being doing with his hands and his words trip over themselves on his tongue in a rush to communicate all the amazing things he sees in _this_ mosaic, or _that_ vase. And even if Liam can’t stand the tedium of academia he could sit for hours and listen to Zayn tell wild stories about the Byzantine Empire or the dude who painted all the soup cans.  

 Liam blinks. The slides on the screen have changed while he wasn’t looking, comparing men tearing up a floor to a guy asleep in a bathtub. He doesn’t pretend to understand half the words coming out of the lecturer’s mouth so he watches Zayn watch her, the quiet happiness on his face when she talks about perspective and…Cantaloupes? Caillebotte?

He sighs, and Zayn leans back into his chest, tips his head back so he can smile up at Liam.

“You can go ahead and sleep if you want, there’s still about an hour of this left,” he gestures at the screen.

“I can make it, Liam tries to insist around a yawn. “Seriously. I’m good.”

 “You sure? It’s tiring work, all that guarding my body.” His tongue pokes out between his teeth when he grins, and Liam swats at him half-heartedly. He can feel his ears going pink.

“Fuck off.”

“Actually though, Li, I’m pretty sure you’ve been on shift almost 24 hours. Get some rest, I won't mind. I got you.”

Liam doesn't bother to try and hold out against that. "Wake me up when you're done then."

"One hour. Got it," Zayn lies and Liam makes a face. He falls asleep to a brief history of the French Revolution and the sound of Zayn's steady, even breathing.

*** 

 Friday arrives with an unbearably early wakeup call in the form of the Duchess of Shipley pounding on Liam’s door, demanding her lazy asshole of a brother get himself out of bed this instant and help her with the horde of floral arrangements that have just been delivered.

“’S too early g’way,” Zayn mumbles down where his face is smashed into Liam’s chest. Liam gently rolls him off so he can holster the regulation Smith & Wesson he’d engaged at the first knock, and which he always keeps within arm’s reach of their bedside table. Zayn is either still too asleep to notice, or too used to Liam’s paranoia to care. Probably both, Liam thinks fondly, planting a quick kiss on Zayn’s shoulder.

It’s the last moment they get to themselves for some time.  

The Duchess whisks Zayn off as soon as he stumbles out the door fully dressed, and very tactfully does not mention his unseasonably high collar or the blush still high on his cheeks.

Liam is posted at the entrance to the foyer, checking the endless line of deliverymen and their boxes with Niall, which means he’s treated to a dozen awful ‘package inspection’ jokes before they can actually get down to business. He makes a face when Liam’s cuff rides up to reveal a fresh ring of bruises around his wrist, though he doesn’t actually say anything which is a not inconsiderable miracle.

Morning slips into afternoon with only a minor mishap of an extra ten crates of veg delivered to the kitchen and the ancient Lady of Kent arriving four hours early. Zayn is off somewhere practicing his keynote with the Queen, and keeps running his hands through his hair so that it stands up on end like he’s been electrocuted. Liam gives him half an hour before he breaks and drags Liam to the pantry to hide.

Liam’s on perimeter sweep with Ramsey and Ethan, which he’s devoutly thankful for. The ballroom is a frantic crush of decorators and PA’s all elbowing and shouting at each other while holding really expensive and breakable objects. He’s more than happy to hand Zayn over to Andy, the Queen’s personal guard, for a couple of hours while he makes a slow circuit around the gardens.

The weather is the same flat gunmetal grey summer days are all over the island, but it’s cool and quiet. A threat of rain, maybe, though that’s not enough to sap the joy out of his brief escape. The only sounds are the crunch of gravel beneath his shoes and the gentle shush of the fountain. And because nobody could accuse Zayn of being inconsiderate he gives Liam a solid sixty minutes to catch his breath before slipping away from Andy to go chain smoke on the roof.

“You told me you were going to quit,” Liam shouts, sticking his head out of Zayn’s bedroom window. Zayn shrugs, which only pulls Liam’s attention to the angry pink mark on his neck, visible even from a distance. He indulges in a small, fleeting moment of pride before the annoyance kicks back in again. Zayn never uses this room except to climb out into a goddamn indefensible tactical location and tar his lungs. Zayn’s supposed to grab him before he pulls shit like this; if he gets shot off the fucking roof Liam will kill him.

He waits impatiently for Zayn to shuffle over to the window, and his anger melts away when he gets a good look at Zayn’s face.  The sickly pale cast to his features wasn’t there when Liam left him this morning. His hands are shaking slightly, too, when he goes to stub out his cigarette.  

“I’m sorry Li.” He sounds contrite. Or, as contrite as Zayn ever gets. “It was just…a lot. I want to get it perfect but I’m not ready—I, I need more time.”    

Zayn’s waltzing has improved considerably in a week; he can lead passably now if the turns are kept to a minimum. Of course, not every instructor can offer the same incentives Liam can. He touches the bruise on his wrist absently.

“You’re gonna smash it,” Liam pulls him across the windowsill and into his arms. “There’s two whole hours left, I’ll call in and we can practice up here.”

Zayn laughs, his voice still rough with smoke. “You think?”

He will. Liam might be more than a little biased, but Zayn is a great public speaker; funny, self-deprecating, earnest. He has the media eating out of the palm of his hand.

“Absolutely,” Liam says, with all the certainty he can muster. Zayn melts, folds himself tighter into the circle of Liam's arms like that’s what he was waiting to hear all along.

***

Zayn smashes it.

Liam had known he would, but it’s still gratifying to see the entire hall enraptured, following each sweeping motion of Zayn’s hands.

On the podium Zayn is all passion and fire, imploring those seated to restore Bradford’s youth arts programs. He’s beautiful and breathtaking and Liam has no fucking clue how this amazing boy found him, plucked him from obscurity and chose Liam to love.

 If anyone thinks it improper for place security to give their prince a standing ovation, they keep that thought to themselves.

***

Six years of working at the palace, and Liam has gotten very good at denying himself things. The champagne floating around in cut crystal flutes is not for him to drink. The lamb served at the laughably oversized banquet table is not for him to eat, no matter how good it smells. And Liam can daydream about the sleek black tuxes and shiny watches all the men seem to be sporting like a uniform all he wants, but his unremarkable black jacket and bare wrist are fixtures of his job. 

“What would you even do with a fancy suit?” Liam mumbles to himself.

The guests have begun to migrate to the open dancefloor. The tasteful string quartet in the corner finishes tuning their instruments and begins to play a spirited two-step. Zayn is pretending to be very involved in conversation with a portly old Lord and his offensive goatee. The man keeps touching Zayn’s arm with alarming familiarity, and luckily Liam is incredibly practiced in denying himself things because he has a burning desire to punch this man in the face.

 _I bet you’re wishing you had that fancy suit right about now_ says the treacherous voice in the back of Liam’s brain. It sounds uncannily like Louis. _You could’ve walked in on his arm. He even offered to put you on the guest list, but nooooo…_

A tux and a media event aren’t a ring but they might as well be. They’re intent and promises, that, to be fair, Liam absolutely has. Nine years isn’t nothing.

It’s just that. Well.

Liam would make a terrible princess.  

He thinks about the future and feels terrified and helpless, which would actually be preferable to the present where he’s watching Zayn in his sleek black suit try and politely extricate himself from conversation, and still feeling terrified and helpless.   

 Tonight is a night of small miracles though, and Liam spots Harry’s wild mess of just-fucked-in-a-hedgerow curls amongst the throng of people exiting for the garden.  

Harry Styles claims a small ancestral property to the North, and a net worth of more pounds than the entire block of flats Liam grew up in. Not that Harry gives a flying fuck about propriety—this season alone the Sun’s linked him in all his tits-out glory to a dozen reputable gentlemen—though his charm saves him from the worst of the speculation. Zayn took an instant shine to him when they met in a figure drawing class at uni a few years back, and Harry always remembers Liam’s name. He’s easily Liam’s favorite member of the peerage.

“Liam!” Harry tries to wrap Liam in his gangly embrace before remembering that as a general rule, security men do not like being hugged while they’re on duty. He settles for an enthusiastic fist bump.

“All right there Liam? Lookin’ proper hard like, can I handle your weapon-” he waggles his eyebrows and Liam rolls his eyes.

“Save it Haz. I’ve actually got a bit of a favor to ask you.”

Harry’s eyes have that gleam to them that means he smells trouble, and his smile is shrewd when he answers, “of course mate, anything for a friend.”

“Could you maybe catch Zayn on the waltz? He’s still new at it and I think he’d have an easier time with a friend.”

“Nothing to do with Lord Nottingham being a handsy old toad, I suppose?”

It’s possible that Liam is less subtle than he thinks he is. Across the dancefloor Zayn’s frozen in place with a polite smile as the band strikes up the overture for a waltz. His eye is twitching oddly, and is Liam wonders if it’s some sort of Morse code SOS. He vows to actually stay awake through Zayn’s lectures next time.

“Harry _please_ , I’m working right now and I can’t—”

“Alright, alright, I got it.” Harry gifts him a cheeky tap on the chin. “Green’s not your color Li. Get your shit sorted, yeah?”

“Thanks Haz you’re clutch.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Harry knocks back another flute of champagne and puts on his most dazzling smile. He deftly inserts himself between Zayn and Nottingham and spins Zayn off, the two of them laughing brightly. Their footwork isn't flawless by any definition of the word but Zayn is smiling that smile that makes his eyes scrunch up into little half-moons, and the Queen looks satisfied when they twirl by. 

Liam settles back into his position on the door post. The night is young and he has a lot to think about.

***

The sun has almost risen again by the time the last of the guests are politely ushered out, the lights dimmed, and the household retired for the night.

There’s a light on in Liam’s room when he returns from a final circuit of rounds. Inside is Zayn, stripped to the waist and busy hanging up his suit jacket in what is nebulously his side of the closet. There’s a cigarette clamped between his teeth and a second tucked behind his ear. He stubs it out in the ashtray on the dresser when he spots Liam in the doorway and grins, small, warm and just for Liam.

“Hey there Sailor,” he squints at Liam in what Liam’s not sure is a tired attempt at seduction or Zayn having taken out his contacts. Liam loves him so much his heart feels overfull.

“Hey.”

He cups Zayn’s jaw where the five o’clock stubble is coming in strong and kisses all the things he’s not articulate enough to say into Zayn’s mouth. Zayn kisses back like he hasn’t seen Liam in a week, instead of a handful of hours. Liam finds himself backed up against the closet door, Zayn’s hands fisted in his collar, with Zayn kissing like he’s about to start something despite the 9am press conference Liam knows is on tomorrow's schedule. He makes a noise that’s swallowed up by the eagerness of Zayn’s mouth, then again when Zayn slips his tongue into Liam’s mouth like it’s a preview of things to come. 

Security are all certified divers—a useless skill, since Zayn hates swimming with passionate intensity—so even though Liam can hold his breath a long-ass time, at some point he has to come up for air. His knees feel weak and unsteady underneath him when he breaks the kiss, lips already raw and buzzing with the afterimage of Zayn’s mouth.

“Didn’t even get my shoes off,” he can feel Zayn’s smug smile where his lips brush Liam’s throat. “Give me a minute? More comfortable on the bed anyway.”

“Hurry up or I’ll start without you,” Zayn starts undoing his belt and Liam makes a beeline for the bathroom.  

He works as quickly as he knows how, shrugging out of his suit jacket and toeing his shoes off at the door. He hangs each piece carefully over the towel rack, willing to hang them properly later and speeds through his nightly routine.

In his haste he knocks over a bunch of Zayn’s expensive hair product from the shelf over the toilet, and is hurriedly gathering it all up when the box falls out. Small, elegant wood siding trimmed in a ribbon of gold, it looks every inch an expensive jewelry box except Zayn wears hardly any jewelry. What little he does wear he certainly doesn’t keep in their bathroom, which is why Liam thinks nothing of opening it, until he does.  

The ring is a soft burnished gold that glows dimly in the terrible bathroom lighting. Liam wipes the water from his hands to hold it up to the light, heart beating double time somewhere up in his throat. On the inside of the band is something in Urdu, the calligraphy graceful but unintelligible to Liam.  He’s not without his suspicions; Zayn has one phrase he likes to murmur, sweet and warm, when he thinks Liam is asleep or too fucked out to hear him. Attempts to get a translation from him are a surefire way to reduce Zayn to a blushing, stammering mess, so terrifyingly sentimental seems like a safe bet.  

He slides it on, unsurprised at this point to find it fits perfectly. The steam from the shower is stifling, thick in his throat and chest. Liam can’t breathe, can’t move, can only stand dripping slightly on the tile and stare at the glint of gold on his third finger.  

He runs the sink again, splashing more water on his face, but the ring is still there, weighing a phantom tonne on Liam’s left hand.

Not a mirage then. 

“Zayn?”

Zayn looks up from the pile of Ghost Rider comics he’s failing to keep from sliding off the night stand. He must hear the quaver in Liam’s voice because he frowns.

“You okay babe?”

Liam swallows. He should put the ring back where he found it and just pretend he’d never seen it. But he doesn’t move, and he doesn’t move, and Zayn is sprawled out on _his_ side of _their_ bed, starting to look properly worried now, and _fuck he’s going to propose—_

“Liam?”

Liam sits, and when he reaches a hand up to pull Zayn closer he can hear a sharp intake of breath that means Zayn’s spotted the ring.

“Good to know it still fits,” Zayn whispers into the corner of Liam’s mouth, and there’s a thready, overwhelmed tenor to his voice that matches the emotions whirling through Liam’s head.  

“I’ve had it for a while now. Saving it for the right moment, yunno?”

“How long is a while?”

“I wanted to be sure you’d say yes,” Zayn twists his fingers into the sheets, prevaricating.

Liam is struck with the same helplessness he felt earlier in the night, trapped on the sidelines out of reach, except here he’s able to step in, to tip Zayn’s chin up so he meets Liam’s eyes. The ring rests against the crook of his jaw, warmed by the heat of his skin.

“ _Zayn_ ,” Liam pleads.

“Three years,” Zayn tightens his fingers where they rest on Liam’s hip, like he thinks Liam is going to run.

He’s not running.

“Do…Do you still,” Liam starts, tripping over his words, and Zayn actually looks a little offended.

“Of course I do. You’re it for me, Li, ‘s just you.” 

And Liam doesn't know what to do with that except kiss him. Over and over, as long as his lungs can hold out before they start burning, as many times as he can around the words _yes_ and _I love you_ , until he has no words left at all. 

 

***

Later, considerably more sweaty and spent, they curl towards each other like parentheses. Liam has on hand spread possessively over the small of Zayn’s back, and he’s enjoying the answering shiver he gets whenever the metal of the ring runs over the dip in Zayn’s spine.

“So, the press conference tomorrow might be more exciting than planned.” Zayn mumbles something with pretensions of being actual words from where he’s tucked under Liam’s chin. Liam raises their clasped hands, “you gonna tell me what this says?”

And Zayn does, fingers laced tight, a secret whispered in-between one sleepy kiss and the next.  

(Liam was right. It’s terrifyingly sentimental. That doesn’t stop him from saying it right back and meaning it, with all his heart.)

**Author's Note:**

> The song Liam and Zayn dance to can be found [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XwgOWDUlDgY)
> 
> Paintings mentioned: 
> 
> [That soup guy](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Campbell's_Soup_Cans)
> 
> [Cantaloupes???](http://www.musee-orsay.fr/en/collections/works-in-focus/painting/commentaire_id/the-floor-planers-7164.html?tx_commentaire_pi1%5BpidLi%5D=509&tx_commentaire_pi1%5Bfrom%5D=841&cHash=4175382124)
> 
>  [Dude in the bathtub](http://www.bc.edu/bc_org/avp/cas/his/CoreArt/art/neocl_dav_marat.html)


End file.
